


kinda goin' nowhere fast

by HearJessRoar



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Friendship, Gen, Idiots in Love, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Not even death can save you from nosy bitches, Platonic Relationships, Willie works food service this poor dude, these ghost boys are touch starved af
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-27
Updated: 2020-11-27
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:47:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27743968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HearJessRoar/pseuds/HearJessRoar
Summary: what do ya think about goin' there with me?Willie is a waiter at that stupid club, and it's not like he can turn in his two weeks' notice after Caleb loses Sunset Curve to Julie.But that's okay, he's got somewhere to go after his bad shifts now.
Relationships: Alex & Julie Molina & Luke Patterson & Reggie & Willie, Alex/Willie (Julie and The Phantoms)
Comments: 38
Kudos: 339





	kinda goin' nowhere fast

It’s not unusual for Willie to swing by the studio on his nights off from the club these days. He’s practically a fixture on the couch, happy and content to listen in on their practices and offer support and opinions and funny stories about being a ghost for so many years.

And they all pretend that he isn’t hiding from a vindictive boss who owns his soul.

Caleb has been quiet lately, and Willie has been sure to be on his best behavior during his shifts at the club. He reports back when anything changes, and for a few weeks, there’s been nothing unusual beyond Caleb giving him the cold shoulder.

So when Willie shows up on a night that Alex _knows_ he’d been working, still in his pink waiter’s jacket, he knows immediately that something is up.

Willie pops in just as Julie and Reggie have decided to sneak into the kitchen to retrieve snacks for their all-night writing session. They’re discovering that sometimes they can eat, even without being at the club, and no, Alex does _not_ want to think about that too hard, thank you very much.

So it’s just him and Luke in the garage when Willie appears, his hair bound up in a high bun to keep it out of his face while he serves lifers and ghosts alike. Luke startles in his chair, hitting a discordant note on his six string.

Alex, lounged on the couch with Julie’s lyrics journal in hand, barely has any time to look up and register the fact that Willie is clearly upset. There’s an unreadable expression in his eyes, and before Alex can say anything, Willie has both hands on his jaw and has pulled him into a hard kiss. 

Like he has something to prove.

Their teeth clack together and Willie pulls away, flopping down beside him.

“Babe-?”

Willie, eyes closed, holds up a hand to silence his questions, reaching blindly behind him to grab for a pillow. He then puts it over his face and _screams_ , hunching over with the force of it.

He does this for several minutes. Luke looks at Alex and Alex shrugs helplessly as he sets aside Julie’s notebook. Just because he’s dating Willie doesn’t mean he knows how to read this situation, though he wishes he did. He’s hoping that Willie will resurface from the throw pillow sometime soon and explain himself, because making confused faces with Luke does start to get old after awhile, and he'd really like to help if he can.

Eventually, when it seems like Willie has yelled himself out, he tosses the pillow back to the corner of the couch. Alex gives him a concerned look and Willie huffs, shifting so he’s crawled into Alex’s space and dropped chest-down across Alex’s legs. He crosses his arms on the other side of Alex’s thigh to support his head, and buries his face in his sleeves.

Alex runs his fingers over Willie’s shoulderblades soothingly, drawing stars and hearts along the ridge of his spine. He avoids where the bruise from the truck that killed him stretches from Willie’s ribs. Alex knows it doesn’t hurt him anymore, but there’s something about knowing that it’s there that makes him steer clear of it regardless. Willie sighs into his own forearms.

Julie and Reggie return loudly, bearing chips and queso as they push open the studio door. Both of them give the two boys on the sofa a questioning look, but say nothing. They turn to Luke, who mimics Alex’s earlier baffled shrug.

Reggie hunkers down sideways in another chair, legs slung lazily over the armrest. He's clearly willing to let whatever is happening play out on its own and ready to witness the fallout whenever it happens. Julie has no such compunctions.

She crunches on a chip, and swats a playful hand down on Willie’s calves. “You’re hogging my couch. Budge up.”

Willie bends his legs at the knee and lets Julie slide in next to Alex. He drops them back down to rest across her lap. She tugs at the elastic on his sock, patterned with little cartoon ghosts today, and lets it snap on Willie’s leg. “What’s up with you, dramatic boy?”

“Lifers are killing me twice,” Willie grumbles into his arm, muffled. “Not you, Julie.” he adds before she can protest.

“Something happen at work?” Luke asks, his eyes wide. “Did Caleb do something?”

Willie shakes his head, and reaches up to tug at his hair. Alex bats his hand away and pulls the hair pins out himself, one by one, tossing them onto the coffee table.

“Nah, just sometimes the lifers can get so nosy. And insistent,” something in Willie’s voice sounds like he’s been a little bit traumatized, and Alex feels protectiveness start clawing at his ribs.

“So this lady-” Willie starts his story, and they all still themselves in anticipation, because Willie is a masterclass storyteller, and this is one that’s clearly pissed him off. Julie has the bowl of queso clutched to her chest, chip frozen in midair so she doesn’t interrupt. Willie takes his face out of his arms so they can hear him better, staring at the side of the sofa instead as Alex methodically takes his hair out of the bun for him.

“This lady tonight, she’s like ‘oh what a nice young man you are,’ which yes, yes I am a nice young man, thank you ma’am. And she starts going on about how tragic it is that I died so young, yeah okay been through this wheelhouse, whatever, and she asks when I died, and I was like, _the 80s, ma’am_ and this woman _zeroes in on that like a sniper._ ”

It’s so quiet while he pauses that Alex can hear the pipes creaking.

“And she goes, ‘oh, my precious daughter died in the 80s’ and I was like, _sorry to hear that ma’am._ and I’ve got other tables, right? So I’m trying to escape, and she _grabs my sleeve_ and says ‘I bet you and she would have a lot in common,’ with That Smile, you know the one-”

They all nod, a little collective shudder going through the room. There really is no greater mortification than realizing that a grown adult stranger was trying to set you up with their kid, and the fact that not even death could save them from such situations is sobering.

Alex’s eyes are narrowed. “No-” he says.

“Oh yes,” Willie says, rolling onto his back so he can use his hands to tell this story. His newly freed hair pools on the couch and Alex combs it flat with his fingers as Willie continues. 

“And I say, ‘ma’am, I’m taken,’ and she _winks at me_ and tells me that I haven’t met her daughter yet. And I say ‘ma’am I’m _gay._ ’ and she says, ‘of course you are, dear. _But you haven’t met my daughter._ ’ Mind you, she still has an iron grip on my sleeve. She wrinkled me, look-” he holds up his arm, where sure enough, creases from the pink fabric being wadded up are very visible.

Willie sighs, letting his hand fall back down to rest lightly on Alex's shoulder. Alex covers his hand with his own in solidarity. 

“And then she tells me that nobody was gay in the 80s. Which, _very wrong on so many levels_ , did she spend the whole decade without turning on the news? And I couldn’t help it, I said, ‘ma’am “The Lost Boys” came out the same year that I did’, which I think just confused her, and then I said ‘Gays didn’t get invented in 2009.’ which was apparently the wrong thing to say. And now I have a write up.” Willie concludes, bringing up the hand that Alex isn't holding to cover his face and scrub tiredly at his eyes.

Julie, free to react now that the story is over, starts laughing. Willie and Alex both look at her with betrayed expressions and she tries to school her features. "I'm sorry, it's not funny-" She hiccups, looking a little hysterical as she crams the nearly-forgotten chip into her mouth to stop her giggles.

Willie cracks a grin. "It's a little funny," he admits, despite the fact that his dramatic entrance betrays exactly how hurt he had been by the whole encounter. Sometimes Alex has to wonder which parts of himself Willie is protecting by acting the way he does.

"Man, even being dead can't save you from the evils of customer service," Reggie says, his face twisted. "The afterlife _sucks._ "

"Ugh, remember that summer we bussed tables at your parents' country club?" Luke asks, his nose wrinkled. Reggie blanches, bristling as he sits up properly. He jabs a finger in Luke’s direction, annoyed.

"How many times do I have to apologize for that-"

Julie, her eyes sparkling with delight at this new information, asks, "Wait, _what?_ "

Reggie groans, dragging his hand down his face. "It was an accident-"

"You ruined my shoes-"

Alex interrupts them both to answer her as Willie toys absently with his fingers. "Reggie spilled half-eaten rich people spaghetti on Luke," he pauses, thinking. "Also, an old man stabbed me in the hand with a fork. Weird summer."

Willie, still holding his hand, flips it over, intrigued. “Huh. Look at that. Fork scar.” He holds up Alex’s hand to show Julie. Alex yanks his hand away when she reaches out to poke at it, giving her narrowed eyes. Julie smiles innocently at him and dips a chip into her bowl of queso.

He plucks at the lapel of Willie’s suit jacket, asking, “You planning on wearing this all night?”

Willie raises an eyebrow. “What is this, Sexual Harassment Saturday? First I got some ancient lifer trying to set me up with her dead daughter, now _you’re_ trying to undress me in front of your friends-”

Alex shoves him to the floor.

Or he tries to anyway; Willie manages to catch himself on the coffee table, laughing at Alex’s red face. 

Julie smacks at Willie’s shins, drawing attention to the fact that as he fell, his foot disappeared into her stomach. They're still working out the mechanics of tangibility, and sometimes things like this happen. Julie points down to where his ankle is protruding from the hem of her shirt.

"I own this foot now."

Willie rolls his eyes and moves so he's sitting properly on the couch between Alex and Julie. "Great. Now I don't own anything."

And as lighthearted as it is, as thoughtlessly cavalier as he says it, Alex feels tightness in his throat and a burning rage in his chest.

Because he’s _right._

And as long as Caleb owns his soul, it will always feel like the Sword of Damocles hangs over their heads during moments like this, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, always waiting for the sudden moment where Willie will grasp at his head in pain, the last shot to his brain where his temple hit the pavement so so long ago recreated at Caleb’s whim.

It hasn’t happened yet, but Alex knows in his heart that the time is coming. Call it anxiety or premonition, but he can _feel_ his borrowed time with Willie slipping by him like sand through his uselessly grasping fingers.

He’s a ghost and he’s the one being haunted by the thought.

Fingers adorned with rings wave in front of his face, and Alex is brought from his thoughts by the quiet jingle of Willie’s bracelets. He’s looking at him, eyebrows furrowed, as the conversation flows around them. Alex shakes his head subtly, trying to get across that yes, he’s aware he just completely zoned out, and _no_ , he doesn’t want to talk about it.

Julie is howling over some story that Reggie is telling her about their misadventures at the country club, probably the one about Luke and the lawn sprinklers, but Alex doesn’t feel like he’s present enough to listen. His fingers clench into the edge of the couch cushion, and all he wants is his drumsticks.

Willie, attuned to his moods incredibly well for someone usually so guarded, notices.

For the second time, he crawls into Alex’s lap, settling in with his head on Alex’s shoulder and gripping one of his shaking hands tightly with both of his. Alex’s other hand rests automatically on Willie’s hip, bunching the pink fabric of his jacket in his fist. Willie runs his thumb over Alex’s knuckles, over the scar from the fork, over his calluses, and something in Alex’s chest loosens, just a little.

They can't do anything about Caleb, not right now. But they can do this for Willie; be there for him, a place to go after work where he can complain all he likes without fear of retaliation from them. His friends like Willie, and he's slipped into their group just like Julie had. Alex knows that when the time comes, and it _will_ , at least he won't be fighting to save Willie on his own.

He holds on tighter like he can keep Willie safe with sheer willpower.

"Are you okay, though?" Alex asks, quietly so only Willie can hear him. Willie shrugs.

"Are you?" he challenges back, freeing one of his hands to tug at Alex’s tee shirt sleeve, smoothing it out where it's been folded over.

It's the best answer he's going to get from him, and Alex lets it go for the moment. He ducks, presses a kiss to the crown of Willie's head, and enjoys how much that simple gesture still makes Willie blush even though he's done it several times by now.

A chip hits him in the cheek and, spell broken, Alex turns to glare at a snickering Julie.

"I'm still sitting _right here,_ " she says, eyebrows raised. Alex throws the chip right back at her and she squeaks, trying to pick the crumbs out of her ponytail when it lands dead center and breaks.

Luke, coming to Julie’s rescue, hops up out of his chair, bounds over the coffee table, and jumps onto the couch between them, narrowly missing Willie’s feet. He swats Julie’s hands away and fishes the chips out of her hair himself.

"....throw queso on your boyfriend, see how you like it-" he grumbles. Alex pulls Willie out of queso range, scooting them both to the farthest end of the couch.

"You ruin his uniform, I ruin you," he says, very much meaning it.

Reggie, a big fan of minding his own business tonight from his chair, interrupts them all with, "Man, I really love you guys."

Alex rolls his eyes. "Yeah, we love you, too, Reg."

Reggie gives him a wide, lopsided smile.

And normally, that'd be perfectly fine. Nice, even.

Except he has his hands in the chip bag and that smile looks _awfully mischievous._

They spend all night cleaning up the studio after their little food fight instead of getting any songwriting done. But that's okay, Alex thinks as he watches Willie hold Julie steady so she can vacuum the wall tapestry.

Most of them might be long long dead, but they're still just stupid teenagers at heart. 

He thinks that after being alone for so long, and then only being around people who wanted something from him, Willie sometimes needs the reminder that he's allowed to have fun with them.

And he's glad his friends are always willing to be that very annoying reminder.

**Author's Note:**

> not me using lyrics from make out monday's song twixter as a title
> 
> im about to go in for my black friday shift and the only thing keeping me alive rn is the idea that i might get comments
> 
> alex being stabbed in the hand with a fork happened to me when i bussed tables and yes i still have the scar ten years later
> 
> as always real unedited and im gonna go back and fix it later but if u liked it even a little bit pls leave me a comment and then read my other fics if u haven't already im not kidding about black friday stealing my soul help me live.
> 
> edit: im in tears u guys thanks for the well wishes i didnt think anybody read my authors notes tbh yall rock


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